


“We Liked You Better Fat”

by orphan_account



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy, Panic! at the Disco
Genre: Aged Down Characters, Alternate Universe: No Band, Fluff, Ft. Eating Disorder Specialist Andrew J. Hurley, Full Details Inside, Full warnings inside, Inspired by To The Bone, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Proceed with caution, Romance, Slow Burn, tw: eating disorders
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-14
Updated: 2019-02-14
Packaged: 2019-10-28 15:18:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17789819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: One more crunch. One more step. One more push-up. Just. One. More. No more candy. No more sweets. No more meat. No more junk. He had to be thin. He-he had to. If he wasn’t thin, he wasn’t pretty, and nobody wants an ugly boy. He wouldn’t make the soccer team if he was fat. No, he had to keep moving, keep working, keep himself slim and thin and trim and always have those ridges of bone sticking out. Lose one more pound. One more step. One more step. One...





	1. One Night and One More Time

**Author's Note:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: Talk of eating disorders ranging from anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder, food addiction, orthorexia, and various others. These characters are mentally unstable in this fic, and their thoughts express this. PLEASE, I cannot stress this enough, proceed with caution. Character ages:  
> Pete Wentz: 22  
> Patrick Stump: 19  
> Joe Trohman: 19  
> Brendon Urie: 17  
> Dallon Weekes: 18  
> Ryan Ross: 17  
> Gabe Saporta: 22  
> The rest of the characters mentioned in the tags are either their current age (as of 2019) or don’t show up enough for it to be relevant. Disclaimer: I do not own Fall Out Boy or any of its affiliates. This is a work of fiction, please treat it as such, and again, PLEASE PROCEED WITH CAUTION. If any of this would be triggering to you, do not read this.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One more. Just one more. One more mile, and he could be done. Just one more...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title taken from “Thnks fr th Mmrs” by Fall Out Boy.

When Pete was younger, he always admired the way the models in magazines had their ribs poking through their skin. He never thought anything not it, just assumed he had a thing for skinny people. In late puberty, when he was about sixteen, he started to bulk up, gain weight, gain muscle. He went from being a skinny kid to being muscular and strong. His ribs were hidden by a thin, soft layer of fat and a hard layer of muscle. He wanted it gone. He wanted it all gone. He wanted to lose those twenty pounds of muscle he gained, wanted the edges of his ribs and hips and collarbones visible without the extra bulk.  

     When he was seventeen, he cut beef and pork out of his diet. He cut down his calorie intake, worked off the slight layer of fat he’d gained. His ribs poked out a little more. His muscle mass went down. His hipbones made a gap between the waistband of his pants and his belly. He wasn’t skinny enough. He wore a girl’s size seven. He wanted to get down to a five.

     He cut chicken, turkey, fish, and all other meat out of his diet at twenty. He lost more weight, went from a semi-healthy five-six and one-thirty to a painfully thin five-six and one hundred pounds. He wanted to be thinner. He liked when people would look at him and ask if he’d eaten, like, ever. He liked to see the bones in his elbows protruding whenever he moved. Liked seeing the gap between his thighs, even when he sat down or crossed his legs. He wanted to be thinner. He wanted to be pretty. He saw picture show of girls with tiny little waists, boys with skinny little arms, and thought they were fat. He could see the slight jiggle in their legs, the way the girls had full chests. They’d look better bony. They’d look better skinny. They’d be so much prettier if they weren’t fat.

     Then again, the same could be said of Pete. He was a size four, now, and he wanted to be a two. His parents were concerned for him, his sister looked at him with pain, and his brother stopped speaking to him. He didn’t care. He wanted to be thinner, and his family saying he was thin enough, too thin, didn’t stop him from seeing himself for the fatass he was. He could see the ever-so-faint lines of muscle in his abdomen, still there from when he was bulky and strong, could see the jiggle in his rump whenever he would do jumping jacks or squats, could see the way his thighs spread slightly whenever he sat down. He wanted it gone. He wanted to see every damn bone in his body stick out, because he wanted to be pretty.

     He remembered, back in high school, at the start of his obsession with being thin, he joined the soccer team, and then, when he got too thin to really play but played anyway, he threw out his knee. The doctor told him he was losing muscle mass in his legs. Pete’s heart soared. No more bulky, heavy muscles weighing him down. He was gonna be skinny.

     His parents started sending him to therapy when his weight dipped below a hundred pounds. It didn’t help. Nothing helped. All the therapists did was tell him his was too skinny and say he needed to force himself to eat, be strong, work with himself. He didn’t want to. He wanted to be skinny. 

     Every other day, Pete would run seven miles. Do a hundred and fifty crunches, sometimes two hundred if he gained a pound. Fifty push-ups. One more. One more. One more.

     One day, when Pete was out with his family, getting clothes for his sister, Pete fainted. He was twenty-two.

     At the doctor a few days later, they weighed him. The nurse’s face soured and she said, “Eighty pounds. How tall are you? Five-six? Jesus...” her face fell. “If you lose any more weight...” she trailed off, then gestured for him to step off the scale. He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. His cheekbones protruded from his face and the tendons in his neck stuck out awkwardly. He looked unhealthy. He looked beautiful.

     The doctor came in not long after. He had dark red hair and a beard with some grey at the ends. On his neck, Pete could see some colorful tattoos. A quick look at the credentials on the wall revealed his name was “Dr. Andrew J. Hurley, Dietician and Eating Disorder Specialist.”

     “Hello, Pete. I’m Dr. Hurley, you can just call me Andy, and I see you’ve...you fainted while shopping with your sister a few days ago. You’re...five-six and eighty pounds you say?” Pete nodded. “Worse than I thought...” Andy muttered, and Pete felt a flutter of pride. “Pete, your BMI is 13. A man your age, 22, five-six, your weight should be between one-thirty and one-forty. You’re eighty pounds, Pete. Does that sound healthy to you?” Pete shrugged. “Who cares if I’m healthy as long as I’m skinny? I want to be skinny, being skinny means I’m beautiful,” Pete knew it sounded crazy, but it made sense to him. Andy ran a hand down his face. “Let me show you something, Pete,” he said, rolling up the sleeve of his button up. More colorful tattoos followed.

     “See this?” Andy asked, running a finger up and down his bright orange arm hair. “Yeah,” Pete said, wondering what hair had anything to do with it. “Now see this,” Andy grabbed Pete’s own tattooed arm, holding it next to his own. Not only was it significantly thinner, but the arm hair was ridiculously thick compared to Andy’s. “Your body’s trying to keep you warm. You have almost no fat on you, so you’re growing thicker hair in an attempt to keep yourself from getting too cold,” Pete didn’t care. He could just shave the hair off, and he’d still be beautiful. He’d still be skinny.

     “Take off your shirt, please, Pete?” Pete dutifully took off his t-shirt. Andy drew in a sharp breath. “Jesus...” Pete heard, and then felt the cool circle of a stethoscope on his back. “Breath in for me, Pete, big deep breath,” Pete’s back rose and fell, the outlines of his vertebrae and ribs getting more prominent upon inhaling. The stethoscope moved. “One more time, Pete,” Pete breathed in one more time. “Okay, sit up,” Andy pressed the stethoscope to Pete’s chest and he hissed  slightly at the cold. A frown crossed Andy’s face and he moved the stethoscope slightly. “Your heartbeat, it’s...it’s abnormally slow, even for patients with... Let me...” he trailed off and removed the stethoscope, grabbing Pete’s wrist and checking his pulse. 

     “37 beats per minute. Average heart rate for non-athletes is 80-100 beats per minute. Pete, I cannot tell you how dangerous this is. If you don’t try to start putting on weight, you’re going to have a heart attack. If you don’t gain weight, and soon, you’re going to die,”

     “They all say that, yet here I am,”

     Andy sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “Pete. Please. You have a family. Your parents, your little brother and sister, I mean, how old is she? Sixteen? Fifteen? She’s young and impressionable, if she sees you like this, she could end up doing the same thing,” Pete’s chest tightened. He wasn’t sure what to think about that. “This is...unusual, for a twenty-two-year-old male to develop anorexia-“

       “I’m not anorexic, I just want to be skinny,”

        “But not the first case I’ve seen. I’m actually working with another twenty-two-year-old male with an eating disorder, so I have some experience in treating this. You can put your shirt back on, Pete, I need to speak to your family,” Pete nodded, watching Andy trudge out the door, looking defeated. 

     In the corner of the office, there was a large mirror. In the reflection, Pete could see the way his skin stretched awkwardly over his ribs and his hips, the way his collarbones and elbows protruded and the way his waist curved inwards, almost looking like a Disney princess with how thin he was. He felt beautiful, but he could be more beautiful if he lost those few more pounds. He was still a little chubby right now, and only if he could get down do seventy pounds. Seventy would be even better than eighty.

     Pete put his shirt back on and watched Andy and his family, brother, sister and all, come back in. “So, Pete, even though I know you won’t listen to me, your official diagnosis is anorexia nervosa. You are extremely underweight, have lost almost all muscle mass and fat, and your mental state, which I understand was already shaky, has been affected. I suggest dietary changes, mental and lifestyle changes, and changes to your exercise routine. I advise you,” Andy turned to Pete’s parents, “To speak to him about these things, and start seeing a therapist, counselor, or psychiatrist regularly.”

     By the time Pete got home, whatever his mother had been cooking in the crock pot was done. “Eat,” she said, setting a plate in front of him. Roast beef, potatoes, broccoli, and a buttered roll. Immediately, Pete was adding up the calories in his mind. 200 calories for the roast beef, 200 calories for the potatoes, 50 for the broccoli, 80 for the roll, 40 for the butter on said roll. 570 total. Sometimes, that was all he ate in a day, if he ate at all. He picked at his broccoli. “Eat!” His mother said more emphatically, and Pete stuffed a piece of broccoli in just to please her. 

     Pete could barely swallow over the thought of how many calories were in that piece of broccoli. Next to him, Hillary stared at her own plate, pushing around her scoop of mashed potatoes. “Eat, Hillary,” Dale said sternly. “I don’t...I don’t need another child with an eating disorder,” Pete slammed down his fork, standing to leave. “No, Pete, sit. I don’t care if you eat at this point, we need to talk. Dr. Hurley spoke to use about something, something he thinks might help...” from her pocket, she pulled a crumpled sheet of paper. The word “REHABILITATION” was printed across the top and immediately, Pete said, “No. I’m not sick, I’m not a drug addict, I’m not dying, I’m not going into rehab,” Pete’s dad sighed softly. “Pete, you’re going. Doctor’s orders. He wanted us to tell you because he didn’t want to freak you out even more and scare some of the other people in the waiting room...there’s only other boys there, not many at all, and it’s more of an...in-patient than rehab. You have a week to pack, and he’ll send you home when he deems you stable, you’re too far gone for him to treat, or...” his father’s breath hitched. “You’re in a body bag,”

      “We’ll still see you, sweetheart, every week there’s family night, but...this is what’s best for you, honey, and...” Dale trailed off. Shaking, Pete stood up from the table and left his virtually untouched food in front of him and left to go on a run.

     It wasn’t one of his running nights, but he needed to calm down. He ran and ran and ran, ran until his legs aches and then ran some more. At least he was burning off those few calories from dinner, and that piece of toast he’d had for breakfast. He was farther away from home than he had been in a while when he finally laid down, laying in the damp grass and staring at the light-polluted sky of Wilmette, Illinois. A loud, feminine, “Hey, Pete,” caught his attention. Apparently, Hillary followed him. “I followed you in the car. Drew drove,” She sat down next to him, pushing her hair out of her eyes. 

     “I can’t say I understand your...your whole thing about wanting to be skinny, but, I. I get it, if that makes any sense? I know it doesn’t but, it...I get it. I get it, Pete and I just want you to get better. I want...I want my big brother back, okay? I want my big brother back, I want him back. I miss the Pete that would wrestle with Andrew while I watched and cheered. I miss the Pete that could throw me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. I miss the Pete that girls would fawn over because he had muscles and he was strong and healthy. I miss that Pete. That Pete was my big brother. Pete, this isn’t you. I love you, but...you have to go until you get my big brother back, okay? You have to...” Pete could hear the tears in Hillary’s voice. “You have to go and bring him back to me. Okay? Just bring back the Pete I knew as my big brother,” Hillary hugged Pete to her chest and Pete winced at the slight squish. He hated the feeling of fat, even if Hillary was a girl and couldn’t help that she was female and had fat on her chest, but hugged her anyway. Somewhere in the very, very back of his mind, he knew she was right, but the rest of him screamed,  _She’s fat. You’re fat. You need to lose weight. Be skinny be pretty be bony be skinny lose weight._

”Come home, Pete. Just come back home,” she said when she moved back. Her eyes were wet with tears. Pete nodded numbly. 

     The entire ride home, Andrew and Hillary said nothing to him, and he said nothing to them either. He went to bed as soon as he got through the front door, and for once in his life, he actually slept.

—*

     A week later, Pete had his shit packed and he was being dropped off at what looked like a giant old house. White siding, with small windows and a giant brown door. Nobody was outside, but there were footprints and a basketball and a grill in the corner, making it look lived in. Obviously. There were six other people that lived there, counting the live-in nurse/babysitter to make sure the boys weren’t swallowing laxatives by the tons or forcing their fingers down their throats or jogging around their rooms for hours trying to burn off calories.

     His mom hugged him, his dad clapped him on the shoulder, Hillary buried her face into his chest, and Andrew said, “Bye, Pete,” which was more than he’d said to Pete in months. By the time the car drove off, the big brown door had opened, and a tall Latino guy had come running towards him. “Hey! New kid!” He said, a grin that could rival Pete’s splitting his face. “Gabe Saporta. Orthorexia. Need some help with that?” He gestured at Pete’s bags. “Uh, yeah, sure,” Gabe’s grin grew and he grabbed two bags, taking them inside. “Usually Mikey Way does this shit, but he’s bedridden right now. He’s...he’s leaving in a few days. He’s too far gone,” his smile faltered, before he dragged Pete inside. 

     The first thing that hit him was the smell. It reeked of baking cookies, frying bacon, and roasting vegetables. Pete gagged softly. “Oh, that? Yeah, they’re making dinner right now, Spencer cooks for us sometimes so we’re not constantly eating frozen shit,” Gabe didn’t look like he felt much better about eating whatever “Spencer” cooked. 

     “You will be rooming with...” Gabe trailed off, then yelled out, “Bren! Who’s the new guy rooming with?” Followed by a muffles shout that Pete couldn’t quite make out. “Oh, man. Lucky! You’re rooming with  _Patrick!_ What I wouldn’t give for a piece of that ass,” Gabe made a face that Pete found both disturbing and amusing. “Anyway, he’s on his walk right now, he’ll be back soon. Upstairs, last room on the left. I’m right behind you,” Pete nodded, moving to the staircase.

     The first thing he noticed in the room were instruments. A guitar here, a keyboard propped in the corner, a snare drum beside the keyboard, and a bass next to the guitar. Two beds, one messy and unmade, the other untouched. “Yeah, Patrick’s our resident music nut. He can play anything, these here aren’t the half of it. Seriously, he could probably play the fuckin’... digeridoo or something if you asked. And he’s a damn good singer, too, if you can get him to do it,” Gabe plopped Pete’s bags next to the clean bed. “Enjoy your stay. See you at dinner,” and with that, Gabe left. “Oh, and don’t bother closing the door. Open door policy!” He called, and Pete groaned.

      He flopped facefirst onto the bed. Why couldn’t people just accept that he wanted to be skinny?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading.


	2. I Thought Of Angels, Choking on Their Halos

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Hey, Patrick?”  
> “Yeah, Pete?”  
> “What do you do when you...”  
> “What, Pete?”  
> “Nothing, it’s dumb,”  
> “Okay. I’m not going to push. Goodnight, Pete,”  
> “Goodnight, Trick,”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title taken from “Just One Yesterday” by Fall Out Boy.

     By the time dinner came along, Pete had slept for thirty minutes, doodled on some paper (the nurse, Spencer came in and took his phone, all of the medicines that weren’t psychiatric, and his pencil sharpener. He was only allowed mechanical pencils. Spencer looked sorry, but didn’t say anything other than, “Dinner in forty minutes,” while he took all of Pete’s valuables.) 

     He still hadn’t seen this mysterious, music-obsessed Patrick since he got back. There was the sound of the door opening and closing, and the sound of a new voice, feet coming up the stairs, and a shower turning on. He was just about to go barge in on this mysterious Patrick, like the weirdo he was, just to get a glimpse, when a chubby kid with a big forehead came and knocked on the doorframe. “Dinner call, new guy. I’m Brendon, by the way, with an “E”,” Pete grinned. Oh, this kid was too naïve. He should  _not_ have said “with an “E”” to the great Pete Wentz. “Okay, Brandon,” the kid’s face soured. “Br _e_ ndon,” he muttered, then stomped away. Pete could feel his footsteps as he walked off, and couldn’t stop himself from thinking,  _My god, what a fucking fatass. He’d look so much better skinny. Imagine the fucking_ cheekbones  _he’d have,_

     In the kitchen, there was a long wooden table with food on it. Pete recognized roasted carrots, squash, and kale, and there were pork chops and breaded chicken as an option for protein. From what Pete had furiously Googled before he showed up, normally there would just be the pork chops. Maybe someone here was Muslim? Or Jewish?

     Spencer set down a bowl of French fries near the end of the table, and Pete was instantly counting the calories. 250. He could never. He took the seat farthest from the fries, which put him very close to the bowl of sliced squash and, now that he looked closer, zucchini. He could see the herbs and oil on them. 25 calories. He could deal with that. 

     Gabe, looking very uncomfortable, took a seat next to the bowl of fries. Orthorexia, if Pete was remembering correctly. Obsession with “healthy” food. Probably why he was taking the seat next to the fries, to try and get himself out of that headspace. If only Pete was lucky enough to have orthorexia; Pete often still wanted to go into his fridge and devour the last slice of cake, chow down on a bag of Doritos, drink an overly sugary drink from Starbucks. He couldn’t do those things, though. They’d make him fat, and if he was fat, he’d never be beautiful. 

     One by one, people filed in. Some were painfully thin, like Pete, others looked semi-normal, and there were a few chubby kids, like Brendon. Spencer wheeled in a kid who was probably four or five inches taller than Pete standing, but probably didn’t weigh any more than him. He was beautiful. His hair was a train wreck, and his glasses made his face look bulky, but he was so thin and beautiful. He could see the feeding tube going across the boy’s face, but could already imagine how beautiful he’d be without it. 

     The kid with the feeding tube introduced himself as Mikey, and instantly Pete recognized the name as the kid Gabe had said was bedridden. He’d be going in a few days. Pete got sad; Mikey was so pretty and skinny. Pete could probably wrap his hand around Mikey’s whole thigh. Pete wished he was that skinny.

     There were no prayers said, no introductions, food just started being passed around the table. A small scoop of squash was all Pete took, until Spencer scrutinized his plate and said, “You have to take a piece of meat, Pete. You don’t have to eat it, but it’s in the rules that you should have read that you need to have protein on your plate in every meal,” a boy with a mane of curls passed the plate of breaded chicken breasts towards him, and Pete took the smallest piece he could find. Spencer’s face soured. 

    “You have to eat at least something every meal for the first week. If you don’t, you lose your daily walk, and bathrooms are closed for an hour after meals, unless you want to keep the door open while I monitor you. Got that, Pete? In case you didn’t read the rules?” Pete nodded, pushing a slice of zucchini around his plate. Gabe looked at him with sympathy, and Pete noticed the small handful of fries on his plate with the carrots and squash. They were probably trying to get him to eat other things. 

     There was almost no conversation around the table, just the sound of forks scraping against plates and mild sounds of disgust (Gabe) and awkward swallowing (the Mikey kid). Nobody asked for more food, and Pete didn’t touch the chicken on his plate. The squash tasted fine, and he supposed he could deal with eating every day, but he didn’t know if he could take the silence.

     By the time Spencer took up everyone’s plates, Pete had been done with his food for twenty minutes, he’d told one kid to, “Take bigger bites, Ryan,” about five times, told Brendon to, “Slow down, Bren,” twice, and, “Stop cutting up your food so small, Joe,” three times. Seemingly everyone was doing something wrong, he’d even said to Pete, “Finish your veggies, Pete, if you take a bite of something, you finish it,” and to Gabe, “Eat the fries with your fingers, not the fork, Gabe,” 

     Seemingly only one person was spared from Spencer’s wrath, and that was some kid, about the same age as the kid who was cutting his food too small, maybe eighteen or nineteen. He looked to have strawberry blonde hair, but Pete couldn’t really tell, as it was hidden underneath a trucker hat. His face was chubby and cherubic and all around cute, even though Pete’s first thought was,  _God he’s fat._ The kid really wasn’t that chubby, maybe a soft bit of baby fat around his hips and thighs, but nothing overly noticeable. He dutifully ate his chicken and squash without complaint, and didn’t make any faces of disgust or eat too quickly. 

     Spencer shooed everyone into the living room and took a seat in the old wooden rocking chair at the front of the circle of sitting arrangements. A loveseat, a recliner, pillows on the floor, and a few little stools took up the majority of the room. Spencer wheeled Mikey in, adjusting the feeding tube slightly to make him more comfortable. He sat down in the big rocker and gestured for everyone else to take a seat. Pete sat on some pillows on the floor, right next to Gabe. 

    “So, we have a new patient with us today. Everyone, say hi to Pete Wentz,” there were some halfhearted greetings, except Gabe, who wrapped his arms around Pete and kissed him smack on the mouth. Spencer let out a sound halfway between a giggle and a sigh. “Gabe, don’t kiss people,” he said, and Gabe pulled away reluctantly. 

     “Well? Introduce yourselves, everyone. I’ll start. I’m Spencer, I’m the live-in nurse here,” Spencer smiled politely. He lightly elbowed Mikey, who appeared to be nodding off in his wheelchair. “Mikey,” he muttered, not every opening his eyes. “Dallon,” a tall, skinny kid. “Brendon,”  Pete noticed he sat very close to Dallon, cuddling his face into the taller kid’s chest and lacing their fingers together. Interesting. 

     “Ryan,” the kid who wasn’t taking big enough bites. “Joe,” the kid who was cutting up his food too small, and presumably, with the prominent nose and truly awesome ‘fro, the reason there was chicken as an option. “Gabriel Eduardo Saporta, at your service,” he squeezed Pete to his chest and Pete was barely able to get away. He was starting to think Gabe was half spider monkey. 

     “Patrick,” the boy with the angel face. Pete felt an odd mixture of disgust and arousal when he saw him again. Thick-rimmed black glasses, fine strawberry hair, eyes that weren’t quite green, weren’t quite blue, and had a faint ring of gold around the color. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he wanted to see this kid on his knees, choking and gagging around-

     Pete stopped his thoughts right there. Patrick was fat. He couldn’t think thoughts like that about fat people. If he started finding fat people attractive, he’d get fat. He couldn’t let that happen. 

     Gabe elbowed him softly. “Oh. Uh. I’m Pete,” there were a few noncommittal mutters of “Hi, Pete.” Spencer sighed. “Can we make this feel a little less like an AA meeting, guys?” There was mild irritation in his voice. “I know it’s not fun, but try to socialize. Talk to each other, get to know each other,” Pete heard Mikey scoff. “Right. Get to know each other. Talk about how many calories we’ve eaten today. How many times we puked,” his voice was sarcastic. Spencer made a face and said, “Okay, Mikey, it’s time for you to go to bed. You all,” Spencer stood and gestured at the rest of them, “Behave,”  

     When Spencer grabbed the handles to his wheelchair, Mikey made no move to stop him. At the base of the stairs, Spencer locked the brakes on Mikey’s chair and lifted him out like he weighed nothing, carrying him up to his bedroom, and then coming back down to get the wheelchair. When he came back and sat in the rocker, he looked at Pete and said, “I’m sorry, Pete, Mikey tends to be a little...pessimistic. His mother stopped coming to see him a while back, and his brother hardly speaks to him when he comes, so he’s...he’s not in the best place mentally,” Pete nodded.

     Suddenly, it was like the floodgates broke loose. People started talking, to each other, to Spencer, to him. Apparently, Brendon sang. Dallon played bass, like him. Patrick, as Gabe had said, could play damn near anything. Spencer himself had had binge eating disorder when he was younger, and that’s why he did this. It was well after ten by the time Spencer said, “Well, it’s time for bed, everyone. Go up to your rooms, I’ll do my rounds and check up on you guys,” 

     As people clambered up the stairs and through hallways to their rooms, Pete noticed how...nice they were to each other. They seemed like family, Dallon and Brendon especially. He wondered what that was like, to have friends who would accept you no matter what. He hadn’t had that in a long time. 

     He sat on the bed in his shared room. Patrick was already on his laptop. Pete wondered how on earth he got to keep it. Judging from the headphones, worn upside down as to not disturb his hat, and the soft sounds of music coming from them, he was fiddling with some kind of music app. 

    Pete stripped down to his boxers, setting a hand on one of his knees. Bone. Beautiful. Skinny. Hard and rigid and skinny and beautiful. He smiled softly. If only he could be skinnier. 

     Patrick shut his laptop and put his headphones away, swinging his legs onto the bed. “So what are you here for?” He asked. His voice was low and smooth. “Hurley says I have anorexia. I don’t. I’m not sick. I just want to be skinny,” Pete heard Patrick’s quiet laugh. “Bulimia, oral purging on my end. Good ol’ binge ‘n’ barf. Haven’t done that in a good while. I still want to, every day, but I don’t. I’m staying here until I feel like I’m ready to go back home without throwing up every time I eat,” 

     “So...can I ask what drove you to it? Y’know, bulimia?” Patrick shrugged. “I was anorexic for a while. Lost a lot of weight, way too quickly. I was about thirteen, a few years after my dad left, and my mom still wasn’t entirely over it. I stopped eating. Before then, I was overweight. I remember, one of my friends at the time told me she liked me better fat, and so I started bingeing, and after, I’d feel horrible about eating so much, so I started throwing up after I ate. I kept it secret for a while, until I went to the doctor and he said I was dehydrated, my teeth were going bad, my esophagus was destroyed, and I was still severely underweight. My mom sent me here,”

     Pete said nothing, simply slowly crawled under the covers. He heard Patrick doing the same. Suddenly, something hit him.

     “Hey, Patrick?”  
     “Yeah, Pete?”  
     “What do you do when you...”  
     “What, Pete?”  
     “Nothing, it’s dumb,”  
     “Okay. I’m not going to push. Goodnight, Pete,”  
     “Goodnight, Trick,”

     Pete didn’t sleep that night. He tossed and turned and dozed, but didn’t sleep until after sunrise. He was woken by Spencer pounding on the doorframe, and saying, “Call your parents. Tell them you’re okay, make sure they’re okay with you still being here. A resident committed suicide,” Spencer’s face was white, and he looked like he might faint. Scrambling to get his clothes on, Pete’s mind rushed to think who it might be. It wasn’t Patrick, who was stumbling into his own clothes, so maybe... Gabe? Or Ryan? Or...

     “Michael James Way, aged 21, time of death, 2:31 A.M., jumped out a second story window and landed on concrete...” Spencer trailed off, wiping at his eyes as he read the obituary. “Way was a resident at a local eating disorder in-patient facility, and was on a feeding tube when he passed. He could not walk well due to lack of muscle mass and tendons in his legs, and was wheelchair-bound around ninety percent of the time. ‘When he was little, he was so full of life,’ Way’s brother, Gerard, 24, stated. ‘Skinny kid, but he was always hungry, always wanted to play, he was happy. I don’t know what changed. All I know is that he’s gone now.’

     “Way’s mother, Donna, was unable to come forward and make a statement. There will be a funeral in one week, closed to anyone who isn’t family,”

     Spencer closed the newspaper. “I found Mikey’s note, under his mattress. His hands were so weak, he could barely write, and there were tear stains on the paper. He said he’d die soon anyway, so why wait? Nobody cared anyway. I couldn’t read anything after that, it’s too shaky. I just...I just hope his family takes it alright,” 

     At breakfast, Spencer didn’t bother telling anyone to eat. Nobody could even think about food, let alone the rules about eating. Someone had just died, on Spencer’s watch, and he was probably too distracted to even think about food. Suddenly, he started crying, not big, ugly tears, but tiny, silent, choking tears, and Gabe set a hand on Spencer’s shoulder, trying to be comforting. 

     Later on, Andy came by to see how they were holding up. He didn’t say much, just spoke to everyone individually and told them not to blame themselves. “Pete. Listen to me, and I mean actually listen. If you don’t get yourself in gear, you’re on the same path that Mikey was, and I don’t think Spencer can handle that. Think of your family, Pete, think of yourself, your body...think of Mikey, what he said in his note. Just. Please. I can’t deal with another death,” and with that, Andy was gone.

     In the yard, Pete saw Andy speaking to a kid that looked like a chubbier, slightly greasier version of Mikey and a woman with a fluffy peroxide ‘do who was crying and holding an unlit cigarette. Gerard and Donna, he supposed. He closed the curtain and went back into the makeshift living area, taking a seat on the loveseat next to Patrick. “Hey, Pete?”

     “Yeah, Patrick?”

     “Don’t die yet. You seem like a decent person,”

     “I’ll try, Patrick,”

      _But I need to lose more weight first._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading y’all.


	3. If Teardrops Could be Bottled

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I don’t even know anymore. It...it hurts. I don’t wanna be sick. I’m not sick. I can’t be sick,”  
> “It hurt me, too, Pete, when I finally figured out I was-“  
> “Just shut the fuck up!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title taken from “Idontwannabeyouanymore” by Billie Eilish.

     The only one that went home that day was Ryan. Pete’s parents almost took him out, but then looked at his forearms and sent him back in.  A young man who looked a lot like Patrick, possibly an older brother, came to see him, but Patrick refused to leave, even after a long argument that involved a lot of swearing and eventually Spencer escorting Patrick’s brother out.  

     Everyone pretty much just stayed in their rooms for the most part, not really eating anything during the meals and not interacting outside of the scheduled group time. Andy sat through dinner with them, not touching any meat or animal products though. Probably vegan. Pete barely picked at his food, nibbling at the skin of a russet potato, but nothing else. Brendon took a bite of his broccoli, but that was the most anyone ate. Even though it seemed Mikey wasn’t really close to anyone here, his passing seemed to take a major toll on everyone. 

     During group time, Spencer put on a movie, some animated thing, possibly Shrek by the amount of green, but didn’t pay it any attention. “Right. It’s my obligation to talk to you guys as a group. I’ll speak with you individually later, but right now...I just want you all to know that you can trust me, okay? I don’t want anyone else to end up like Mikey. When I first met him, he seemed like he’d recover, he really did. He was a happy kid, eating like a champ at first, and then he just...lost it. Please. I can’t deal with another Mikey,”

     Pete heard Patrick sigh from across the room. Gabe tensed next to him. “I...” Patrick said, setting a hand on Spencer’s thigh. “It must be hard. None of us were super close to him, but when he died, I think it kind of hit us just how much he meant to us. We’ll miss him, definitely,” there was a matter of assent. Brendon tucked his face a little deeper into Dallon’s chest.

     That night, after Pete took his walk and shower, he found Patrick laying in bed, staring at the ceiling. “What’s up, dude?” Pete asked, sitting on his bed and towered his hair off. “Nothing, just thinking, I guess,” Pete made a noncommittal noise in the back of his throat. “How come people have eating disorders, you know? Like, how come there’s always a standard of beauty that we feel like shit if we don’t adhere to? Even now, I’ve gained a little too much weight, I feel like shit, I want to puke and run and sweat it off until I’m skin and bone, even though I know it’s not healthy, and...I guess I’m just scared,” Pete felt an odd surge of protectiveness. “I get that,” Pete said, before putting on a clean pair of boxers and turning in early.

     He heard Patrick crying himself to sleep later that night.

     “Come on, Pete, Patrick, scheduled weigh-ins. It’s Thursday,” Spencer sounded distraught, but Pete simply rugged on his clothes and stumbled out of bed. He noticed that Patrick’s face was red and blotchy, and not from sleeping on it funny.

     “One-hundred and forty-two pounds. Little chunky there, Patrick, but better than you were,” Spencer noted on his clipboard. So far, he’d heard one-hundred and seventy pounds (Gabe), two hundred pounds (Brendon), and one-hundred forty pounds (Dallon.) The rest had been too far up for him to hear. “Okay, Pete, on the scale,” Pete stepped on the wobbly plate of the scale.

     Spencer moved the weights along the bars, and frowned when he didn’t even hit a hundred pounds. “Seventy-nine pounds. You’ve lost weight, Pete, and even one pound can be detrimental to your health,” mentally, Pete cheered. He was skinnier than he had been. Then, some small, sane part of him though of Mikey, how thin his thighs were, the way his skinny neck was twisted in an awkard position from the fall. That sane part of him told him that he might be the next one. He couldn’t help but wonder if that sane part was right,” 

     Dallon looked at him with a mixture of awe and disgust, and Patrick just looked sad. “I’m...sorry,” he said, but he wasn’t sure what he was apologizing for.

     “I’m sorry I couldn’t talk to you last night, Pete, I just got too busy with everyone else. I just wanted to say...Mikey, he was probably four inches taller than you, and weighed eighty pounds when he...when he passed away. Please. For me. For your family. Try to gain some weight. I know there’s some of the old you in there, I can see it, listen to your body. You’re starving yourself, Pete, and think of what might happen when you starve yourself to death. Think of your sister. She’s only fifteen, Pete, and your brother isn’t even twenty. Think of your parents, knowing their child died of anorexia, something that can be treated. They’d think it was their fault, Pete. Please. Just. Try,”

     It was later announced that when anyone in the in-patient went on permanent feeding tube like Mikey, they would be leaving within the week. “New rule,” Spencer said, before going back to his chicken nuggets.

     Later that night, after going to bed, Patrick cried himself to sleep again. He wasn’t the only one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have tumblr now: @jaytylera-needgoodgayshit. Also, sorry it’s really short, but I’ve been really busy and my phone is being dumb and I only have limited access to WiFi right now.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed!


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